时间:2018-12-30 作者:英语课 分类:词汇大师(Wordmaster)


英语课

  AA: I'm Avi Arditti with Rosanne Skirble, and this week on WORDMASTER: A listener, Akbar Gandi in Iran, is asking for an explanation of "countable 1 and uncountable nouns and the difference between a name and a noun."

RS: English teacher Lida Baker 2 has the answer, starting with some background about nouns.


  LIDA BAKER: "A noun is usually defined as a person, a place, a thing or an idea. So you have abstract nouns, things like love or democracy or beauty. OK, those are abstract nouns. Furthermore, nouns can be divided into two categories.

"There's what are called proper nouns, which are the ones that start with a capital letter, like Barack Obama or California or English. And then there are common nouns, which are the ones that start with a lower case letter, like a table or a radio or a puppy.

"So to answer the writer's second question first, names are proper nouns, OK? They start with capital letters. So a name is one kind of noun. Now the writer's first question is actually the much more interesting one."

AA: "And this has to do with the difference between countable and uncountable nouns."

LIDA BAKER: "Right, and uncountable nouns are also called non-count nouns. A count noun kind of is self-explanatory, because it's something that you can count.

"For example, 'microphone' is a countable noun. You can say one microphone, two microphones and so on. So anything that can actually be counted and that has an s to form the plural 3 is a countable noun.

"Non-count nouns are ones where you cannot separate them into individual units. So 'water,' for example, is a non-count noun. You can't say 'one water' or love -- 'one love,' it sounds silly.

"Now, why is this an issue for people who are learning English? For one thing, we have nouns that represent whole groups, but within those groups there are individual items which are countable but they have a different name.

"Let me give you some examples. So we have a word like 'luggage.' It's correct to say 'I need to go buy some luggage.' But if you want to speak about an individual item within that category, you have to use the word suitcase or bag. 'I need to buy a suitcase, a bag.'"

AA: "Right. Or two suitcases would equal luggage.

LIDA BAKER: "Right, right."

AA: "Or three or four. Or even one bag."

LIDA BAKER: "It's very confusing. I'll give you one more example, something like the word 'food.' 'I'm going to the supermarket, I'm going to buy some food.' But 'I'm going to the supermarket, I'm going to buy three packages of spaghetti.'

"Or 'I need to buy apples, I need to buy eggs.' So the category 'food' is uncountable, but the items within that category are countable. So that's one of the reasons that count and non-count nouns are very confusing for people who are trying to learn English.

"Now, another problem is that a lot of nouns which are uncountable in English are countable in other languages, so when people are translating they end up making mistakes. And that's why it's so common for us English teachers to hear students making mistakes like 'Can you give me some advices.' Or 'I need some informations.'

"Or 'There's a lot of pollutions in that city.' Or 'I can't go out tonight because I have a lot of homeworks.' All those nouns are actually uncountable: advice, information, pollution, homework. Those words don't take an s because they're uncountable."

RS: Lida Baker says another complication is that some nouns are both count and non-count nouns, but the meaning changes.

LIDA BAKER: "Let's take an example like 'coffee.' And there's a store in my neighborhood that sells all kinds of different 'coffees.' In other words, many different varieties of coffee. OK, so there's an example where the same word is used in both a count and a non-count sense."

AA: English teacher and author Lida Baker in Los Angeles.

RS: And that's WORDMASTER for this week. With Avi Arditti, I'm Rosanne Skirble.



adj.可数的,可以计算的
  • The word "person" is a countable noun.person这个词是个可数名词。
  • Countable nouns have singular and plural forms.可数名词有单数和复数之分。
n.面包师
  • The baker bakes his bread in the bakery.面包师在面包房内烤面包。
  • The baker frosted the cake with a mixture of sugar and whites of eggs.面包师在蛋糕上撒了一层白糖和蛋清的混合料。
n.复数;复数形式;adj.复数的
  • Most plural nouns in English end in's '.英语的复数名词多以s结尾。
  • Here you should use plural pronoun.这里你应该用复数代词。
学英语单词
-peroxide
across the board
All's right with the world.
alternative learning environments
autograft
automatic feed punch
ayene
bacteriod
barium hydrosulfide
blind-hole
boric ointment
cakecrumb
calibration load
carpesiolin
cell - mediated immunity
cellulose digestion test (of ruminal function)
cenninis
cessations
chainreactor
chance of survival
channel selector switch
chorionic plate
churchesset
cistine
computer telex exchange system
consecutive aneurysm
crated weight
dermatological diagnostics
designation marks
discharge leg of syphon
duration of diapause
elevated pole
endarteriectomies
Eric Arthur Blair
extorts
factualities
ferron
first order stereoplotter
foreign public law
Fourier'slaw
Frenkel defect
groaty
helical pressure tube
henfests
himmel
hoot
in-coming inspection
internal fabric
irregular choripetalous corolla
James Clark Ross
Jasminum wangii
Klamath Forest National Wildlife Refuge
Lady Bountiful
land variety
least square correlation
lymph node permeability fsctors
magnetotherapeutic
Makayo
mieskeit
mist
multi-ply wood
mycarose
non-dutiable
oil tanker design
Oldo
out-lading
overcapacity of pump
part-time job
pattern-recongnition method
pedobaromacrometer
pengoes
pentek
phytoh(a)emagglutinin
positive pole
posterior ethmoidal foramen
quasigovernment
regular normed space
rescyve
saddle bracket
SCD (severe core damage)
sealing life
serosuitability
side-comb
silicated
siting investigation
skew pantograph
spool bar
stable subgroup
Stereomycine
sub-warden
sublevel blast-hole caving
subtreasuries
T-even
taking of samples
Talanta
tellez
TGV-Atlantigue
transmission finished
traumatic bone cyst
unlimited war
uster eveness tester
voting precinct